Motor cores are usually made out of sheets of steel material, which can be oriented or non-oriented. Oriented steel has oriented, or anisotropic, properties in the direction that the steel is stretched or rolled, thereby having superior magnetic properties in that direction of rolling. On the other hand, oriented steel has inferior properties in the other, crosswise directions of rolling. Since stator cores of motors are round and have flux flowing in perpendicular directions in the teeth (radial direction) and back iron (around the circumference), the use of oriented steel helps magnetic flux transmission in one area of the stator, but hurts it just as much in a different area of the stator so that its overall effect is usually zero. Thus, almost all motors use non-oriented steel.
In non-oriented steel, the steel is typically rolled in one direction and punched using dies into the desired shape. In many cases, the entire piece is then annealed to remove any incidental directional properties due to rolling and punching. As a result, the magnetic flux in motors made of non-oriented steel flow through the steel moderately well in any direction with no direction of flow being superior to another and no direction being inferior to another.
However, it would be desirable to provide a motor stator that utilizes the benefits of both oriented and non-oriented steel so as to obtain the more efficient, magnetic flux transmission in some areas of the stator without sacrificing magnetic flux transmission in a direction cross-wise to those areas.